Forensic Files

The crime scene was awash with blood, bespeaking the horror of the crime: the murder of two young boys and the stabbing of their mother. Forensic scientists carefully analyzed the blood evidence and found it told the story of an assailant who had gone to great lengths to alter the crime scene.

Scott Dunn's case was filed as missing persons although large traces of blood and cover-up were clearly found in his bedroom. Scott's father refused to have his son's disappearance ruled as such.

On a windy Kansas night in October, 1995, a mysterious fire swept through the home of a prominent doctor. Two of her family members made it out alive; two did not. In the debris, investigators found evidence which told them much more than how the fire started.

In 1990, Shirley Andronowich's body was found one morning after she was murdered and mutilated. Eyewitnesses told police Shirley and her husband Ed were seen fighting in a bar the night before. Police first suspected Ed and even arrested him after he confessed to the murder. But all forensic evidence proved that Ed had actually nothing to do with the crime

Sometime during a neighborhood Christmas party, five-year-old Melissa Brannen disappeared. No one saw where she went or noticed anything unusual. Investigators turned to forensic science to help them see what the witnesses missed. The young girl was never seen again... but fiber analysis led police to a suspect nonetheless.

The doctors at the hospital couldn't determine the cause of Bobby Curley's hallucinations and intense pain. At first, they treated it as a neurological disorder, Guillen-Barre Syndrome. But Bobby's condition deteriorated. Something he was being given in the hospital wasn't curing him, it was poisoning him.

Who was the sexual offender that murdered two adolescent boys in Nebraska? A criminal profiler from the FBI said he would definitely kill again. The key to stopping him would be the unique composition of the "junk rope" he used to tie his victims. Omaha police and the FBI use rope analysis, psychological profiling, forensic odontology, and even hypnosis to bring a 116-day manhunt to a close, and solve yet another murder in another state.

Mark Fair left for work and his fiancée, Karla Brown, stayed home. Later, Mark found Karla dead. Karla's body told police that she was a victim of sexual assault. During the autopsy, they were able to re-examine bite marks on her body. A computer gave a view of the marks and forensic odontology identified the killer.

Janice Johnson was found dead at the foot of her basement stairs. Police in Nova Scotia had to unravel the circumstances surrounding Janice's death and answer the question: Was it an accident... or murder? Different authorities rule both ways, and it takes years - and a astonishingly unique recreation of the death - before justice is finally done.

In 1996, more than a dozen children in Seattle, Washington, were fighting for their lives. Each one of them had contracted a serious illness, and no one knew what it was. When one of the children died, investigators knew the clock was ticking... and they needed to isolate the cause and find the cure before time ran out. Epidemiologists and other scientists find all the victims contracted the same strain of bacteria... but how?

Lori Keidel, her two sisters and her brother were left home alone while their father went to a nearby laundromat. Suddenly, a large fire engulfed their brick ranch home. Only a few months earlier, the children's mother had disappeared and made no effort to contact them. Lori found the courage to tell police that she had witnessed her own mother's death.

Young Navajos on a reservation in the southwest were dying at an alarming rate. CDC officials had never seen anything like it; the mysterious illness had claimed the lives of more than 20 people. The tribe's medicine men provided investigators with a critical clue... which would lead halfway around the world to a most unlikely killer.

While on a business trip in 1986, Ed Post started his day by jogging in downtown St. Louis. When he returned, he found his wife lying face-down in the bathtub, unconscious. She was rushed to the hospital, but it was too late. She had drowned. Was it possible a faulty towel ring was to blame? An industrial testing laboratory, an accident re constructionist, metallurgy analysis and a determined detective unravel a family's secrets and the truth about what happened in the hotel bath.

While on a business trip in 1986, Ed Post started his day by jogging in downtown St. Louis. When he returned, he found his wife lying face-down in the bathtub, unconscious. She was rushed to the hospital, but it was too late. She had drowned. Was it possible a faulty towel ring was to blame? An industrial testing laboratory, an accident re constructionist, metallurgy analysis and a determined detective unravel a family's secrets and the truth about what happened in the hotel bath.